If you're desperate to knit yourself a Sackboy, the lovely people at the Sun are hosting our unofficial pattern designed by Alan Dart. (Yes, they have permission to do so, just as we've had permission from Sony!) Just click here to visit the page, then on the paragraph in red to be able to download the PDF.

You can enter the HobbyCraft competition via text now, although please note that there's a typo in the mag - you need to send your entries to 87474, NOT 87979!

Yes, we missed the HobbyCraft competition from our list of issue 50's competitions. We've sorted the glitch out now, so click HERE to go to the HobbyCraft competition page.

If you prefer to enter by text, we're in the process of setting up the phone entry system now, but it may take a while as Elizabeth, who usually does it, is off sick, and I'm not great with technology!

The February issue of Simply Knitting hits shops nationwide today and we're really excited because it's our 50th!


Click for a larger image.

Can you believe Simply Knitting is 50 issues old? We can hardly credit it, but it's totally true! To celebrate, we look back at the first 50 issues – and bring you a fab new one!

We've got not one but four tops for you to knit for yourself. They're the perfect indulgence after all that holiday knitting. Choose from an elegant embroidered tunic, a comfy copper cardigan or the smart green jacket shown on the cover.

The fourth top is a cosy Fair Isle jumper in chunky yarn – and it's extra special because there's a coordinating version to knit for little girls. It's a lovely way to make a mum and daughter outfit which you'll both love to wear, together or separately.

And that's not all. We've got a lovely cabled cushion to brighten up your sofa and lover's gloves – perfect for holding hands on a romantic winter walk! We've also got a selection of quick gifts to knit and crochet.

To celebrate our 50th issue, Alan Dart has designed us a special treat. She's called Simply, and yep, she's knitting! We hope you love her as much as we do.



Your free gift: exclusive needle roll. Our pretty needle roll is perfect for keeping your pins neat whether you're out and about or at home on the sofa. Sort your needles by size to make it easy to find the ones you need, or wrap up all the needles you'll use for your next project and carry them safely along on holiday or to your knitting night.



Other great things to look out for in issue 50 include:   

• The Knitted Landscape: scarves for statues, caps for cairns and more besides.
• Designers talk about their favourite moments from our first 50 issues.
• How one knitter is helping an African community.
  

And don't miss any of your usual favourites: we've got hot new yarns, great products and all the latest knitting news as we put new books, patterns and yarns through their paces.

Happy New Year!

(We're not in the office, by the way. This entry was written before Christmas and our interweb software is uploading it automatically. If you've sent us an email, our office is still locked up and we still can't answer it!)

Anyway, have you made a New Year's Knitting Resolution? Mine is simple: to learn something from everything I knit. Since starting work on Simply Knitting a year ago my skills have really come on in leaps and bounds – Kirstie forced me to knit my first sock, I did my first knit from a chart, I've learned neater ways to sew up shoulder seams – and I want to improve them even more. From here on, the only time I'm doing plain stocking stitch if it's in a garment where there's a lot of shaping, or I'm doing it with two or more colours. I will learn something from everything I knit is a pretty good resolution, but here are some more you might like, if you haven't made a resolution already.

I will buy more local yarn. This is a great one, especially if you're in an area where lots of yarn is produced. In these credit-crunch times it's a great way to support regional employment, and because these yarns have a smaller carbon footprint than those shipped halfway round the planet they're an eco-friendly choice too. You could purchase yarn made from the wool of sheep in your area (if you're in an area without much livestock, you could opt for generally British wool), or you could start shopping for yarn dyed by someone near you.

I will use up my stash. Forgo the pleasures of new yarn and rediscover all the fab things you've already squirrelled away!

I will be a more sociable knitter. Join a knitting group or start attending workshops and enjoy the social aspect of your brilliant hobby. Your fellow knitters can teach you new things, or you can learn from them, and you'll have a great time chatting about everything under the sun. If you have trouble getting out and about, sign up to a group like Ravelry or a Yahoo or Livejournal knitting group. Like so much in life, knitting is even better when you share it.

Have I missed your resolution from the list? If so, I'd love to hear about it!

There's a new online shop in town, and it's called Crafty-Yarn! Abby Evely opened Crafty-Yarn on 1 December 2008, so it really is brand-spanking new. We caught up with Abby to find out how the tricky first weeks have been going.

"It was quite scary but quite exciting as well!" she told us. "It’s all happened gradually over the last eight or nine months: I started a knitting group, then a market stall and now I've got the website."

Frustrated by the selection of yarn available locally, Abby was intrigued by a chance meeting with Tom Coomber from Artesano. "I met Tom at the IKnit Day in 2007 and got talking and that’s how it got started," she says. A keen knitter since age five, this was the encouragement Abby needed and she decided to start off as a market trader. She quickly added new yarns to her stock as customers told her what they liked and wanted and now stocks the full range of Artesano yarns, as well as yarns from Manos del Uruguay, Debbie Bliss and James C Brett, to name just a few. She's determined to keep developing her business and serving her customers better. "I'm focussed on customer service," she says. "I like to get orders out within 24 hours and if I haven’t got it I’ll try my best to get it."

An online shop was the obvious next step, and she's already looking at making improvements to it, so don't be too surprised if you spot one or two changes! Abby is also looking into sourcing yarns from abroad to give her customers even more choice. "I've just taken on Drops Design Kidsilk and Sable 4 ply," she says, "and I've got a yarn called Lotus, which exclusive to Crafty-Yarns at the moment. It's a really buttery pure cashmere DK. It's quite expensive but well worth it!"

Opening a new online shop right before Christmas has kept things busy, but Abby's enjoying the work. "I’ve already sent my first orders to New York and Gibralta," she told us, "and I've been testing all the yarns I stock, so I can tell people what it knits up like – or if you come by the market stall, you can see it!"

As a mum of two young girls, Abby appreciates the freedom that running her own business gives her. "My two are a bit young to learn to knit. They do like to 'help' though!" she laughs. "They’re always happy recipients of handknits. They’re the knitters of the future and my best advocates – they keep talking to people about knitting!"

So what's on the cards for 2009? Finding more great yarns to stock, and keeping the parcels heading out all over the world, of course. But what else? "I'm going to teach myself to crochet," she says, "and maybe knit something for myself. I never do that any more!"

Visit Crafty-Yarn to check out their gorgeous stash of yarns, patterns and accessories. You can order online or by calling Abby on 0118 943 1144. On Saturdays, you can find Abby's market stall at Wokingham in Berkshire and on Tuesdays she's at Beaconsfield in Buckinghamshire.

Simply Knitting issue 50 hits the shops on Friday 2 January. Enter our great giveaways and competitions by using the links below.

King Cole hoodie kit giveaway, page 6
Sirdar yarn giveaway, page 10
Glasgow show tickets giveaway, page 12
Prize crossword, page 94

We'd like to wish you all a very happy holiday, and to celebrate we've put together a little something we thought you might like. We've had a few emails about it, so we know it's on your wishlists...yes, it's The Knitter!

Issue one of our new sister magazine is off with the printers, and while they work their magic ready for it hitting the shelves on Wednesday 7 January 2009, we're giving you a first look at the cover – and a peak inside it!


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We're thrilled to welcome our new sister – doesn't she look glam? This issue is packed with complex, challenging designs from top designers including Martin Storey, Louisa Harding and Erika Knight.

It's bursting at the seams with inspirational ideas for experienced knitters including techniques to try, yarns to use and books to read, so don't forget to ask your newsagent to save you a copy!

Oh – and that promised peak inside? The new team at The Knitter have selected six pages from the magazine, giving you a closer look at three of their 16 designer patterns, so have a look at The Knitter online today.

Robin and the Seven Hoods was on at the weekend. Did you see it? One of the running gags throughout the film is that one of the gangsters is a knitter. One of the gangsters is knitting throughout the film, but he's clearly not very good at it as his piece doesn't grow very quickly over the course of the film! At one point he tries to teach another gangster to knit, unsuccessfully, but the dialogue did make me reflect on one thing – where do non-knitters get the phrase 'Knit one, purl one' from? I've lost count of the number of times people have said to me, 'Knit one, purl one, that's what you do'. How do you respond to that? 'Yes, but only when I'm doing 1x1 ribbing'? It's hard to think of a polite way to say, 'No, that's what I don't do' without it also carrying overtones of 'and you are being a prat.' I suppose when you're a burly mobster, no-one dares to try to tell you how to do your hobby...

There will be no-one to answer emails to the Simply Knitting email account from the 24th December to the 5th January inclusive. Our parent company, Future, closes its offices over Christmas so even though we love hearing from you, we won't be able to read your messages, nor will we be able to deal with any pattern queries, not unless we break in to our own building (and then we'll get a free ride in a police car for our troubles...).

You won't miss out on the blog over the holiday - Elizabeth has prepared a number of entries to go live over Christmas, and I'll try to do a few too. We hope you have a great time, and we look forward to hearing all about your Christmas knitting!

These beautiful Christmas baubles were made by filling clear glass baubles bought at a craft shop with left over yarn scraps. They're beautiful and unusual – and the quickest hand made "knitting" gift we've seen so far!

They're a great way of using up scraps of yarn – the crazier the better. And of course, as their creator points out, in case of knitting emergency, break the glass and you'll have enough yarn to keep you going for a row or two!

The same creative brain which came up with these beauties is behind the For the Love of Fibre blog, so pop along to find out what other fab ideas this keen knitter, spinner and crafter has bubbling away or click on the image above to go straight to her post about the baubles themselves.

Millions of mums in poor countries get low-quality health care, or are forced to go without it altogether. Every minute a woman with no medical care dies in pregnancy or childbirth – a mum who would have cared for her baby, carried on being a friend, a sister, a daughter, a wife – and a mum to her other kids.



Oxfam are campaigning to raise awareness and funds to stem this tide – and they've been doing it with knitting. Over the last six months thousands of knitters have created 14,000 squares, each one representing a mum who is no longer alive to care for her baby.

The next part of the campaign is the big stitch up: sewing the squares into blankets. Oxfam are looking for volunteers to help with the making up. The blankets will be exhibited aroudn the UK on International Women's Day in March and will afterwards be sold in Oxfam shops and at festivals to raise money for Oxfam's work to fight poverty.

Want to get involved?
Contact Alice Delemare, Oxfam campaigner, by emailing adelemare@oxfam.org.uk or calling 0113 394 4293. Give details of your name, group name, an address and the number of blankets you are willing to sew together and Alice will arrange for squares to be sent to you. Each blanket will be 48 squares large and will need to be returned to Oxfam before the beginning of March.

Alice says: “We need the help of enthusiastic groups of people who can sew! Everyone can get involved in the fight against maternal mortality, especially members of knitting circles, community or religious groups.”

So give her a ring, and see if you can help a fellow knitting fan out with a bit of making up.

We had a great Secret Santa at Future's Stitch'n'Bitch this lunchtime. We got the idea from Get Knitted's knitting club one. Instead of buying something for the swap, we each brought in something from our stash worth £5-£7 and had a sort of lucky dip with it.

At a show earlier this year I bought some gorgeous silk laceweight in what I thought was pale turquoise, but discovered was actually mint green when I got it out into the light. (Curse you, exhibition hall lights!) I've done nothing with it because I've got very yellowy skin and worry that mint green is not my colour. However, out of the stash swap I pulled a skein of beautiful Knitglobal Superkid, mainly mohair in virtually the same shade of mint green. It's beautiful, and I feel a scarf coming on, a scarf making the most of the contrast between smooth, shiny silk and the soft, fluffy mohair. If the scarf doesn't suit me, nuts to it!

We all got lovely things out of the stash. Jen, The Knitter's tech ed, pulled out gorgeous patchwork fabrics and Elizabeth got two balls of alpaca. Green seemed to be the in colour to donate, I think because we all like it and have lots of it rather than because none of us like it. The swap was such a success we're considering doing another one at some point. Perhaps you could try it with your own knitting club - it's great!

Bettie Page, the 1950s Queen of Pin-Up, has passed away, and so I thought I'd review a blog heavy on vintage knitting today. Angela's Pearls is a fairly new blog, so it doesn't have a large archive of older posts to browse through, but what's there is beautifully written.

Knitting from vintage patterns is always going to be a little tricky. To begin with, the exact type of yarn specified won't be available any more, and here in the UK the old numerical system of sizing needles has given way to one where needles are numbered according to their diameter in millimetres. I don't know if Angela faces a similar needle problem, as she blogs for Canada, but in her blog she shows you vintage patterns and, in the case of the 'Butterfly Shrug', talks about her experiments in making these old designs in the yarns available nowadays.

If you've got a stash of vintage patterns, Angela's Pearls might just inspire you to dig them out and try knitting a few things. I learned to knit about four years ago (I'm forever saying it: Simply Knitting taught me how to do it) and was enthusiastic about learning because I love vintage clothing and was looking forward to knitting from period patterns. You know what? I've never done it! Reading Angela's Pearls is really inspiring, and a site that makes me want to pick up my needles right now. 

You can now get updates about The Knitter delivered straight to your inbox! Visit www.theknitter.co.uk to sign up to their newsletter now – and get a better look at this beautiful cabled jumper from issue one!

We'll still be posting updates here on the Simply Knitting blog – and we hope to have a bit more news for you soon!

We're already getting loads of enquiries about our unofficial Sackboy pattern. If your local shop doesn't have issue 49 in stock, or you live overseas and just can't wait for Borders or your local retailer to get issue 49 in, you can buy single issues from My Favourite Magazines. They sell our subscriptions, but you can also get single issues from them.

(We're quite staggered by how popular he's been. Then again, every time we took him out of his box in the office we couldn't stop 'aaaaaw'-ing over him.)

As we said in issue 48, we've got so many clubs on our list that we couldn't fit them all in the magazine! We'd like to put them all up on the blog, but we won't put your details up unless you contact us and say that's OK.

We know a lot of people use their personal email address or mobile number as the contact for their group and may have concerns about having those details up on the internet. Don't forget: there are lots of free email services online, so you can start a new email address for your knitting group. We like gmail.com (run by Google) but there are lots of others.

We're getting in touch with all the groups, and messages are coming back in slowly. If you'd like to see your group here, please email us or leave a comment on this post with the following information (we'll delete the comments as we add the information to the list, to make it easier to search and keep current):

1. Yes, I am happy for these details to be posted online.
2. My knitting group is called ____
3. I am the organizer. My name is ____
4. Knitters can contact me by (either/both) phone/email at ____
5. We meet in ____ town in ____shire in the North East/North West/Midlands and East/South East/South West/London/Channel Islands/Isle of Wight/Scotland/Wales/Northern Ireland/Other
Optionally, you can tell us a bit more about the club, give us the URL for your website or if you're happy for people to just turn up tell us when and where your club meets (e.g. "Jen's Cafe, 13 Market Street, Anytown, Someshire, 7-9pm every first and third Tuesday").
To keep the list manageable, we may not post all the information you give us.

South East

Knuttyknitchix - Stevenage,
Contact Charlotte on 07957 488 398 or at charlotte@knuttyknitchix.org.uk or Julia at Julia@knuttyknitchix.org.uk
More info: We meet at each other's homes on a Saturday afternoon approx every 3 weeks.
Added 9/12/08

In the meantime, if you'd like the full list we used to print in the magazine, please send a stamped, self-addressed envelope to: Club Directory, Simply Knitting, Future, 30 Monmouth Street, Bath BA1 2BW.

If you'd like to update a group listing, please email us.

We missed out the making up instructions for the Christmas Pudding decoration in the Small Wonders (part 2) in issue 48. Please find the instructions below!

We've also had a couple of readers asking about the increasing for the pudding and other decorations. Clare has a slightly unusual way of doing her increases which is causing a bit of confusion. Clare increases between stitches, so her instruction “inc 1, K1” will turn 10 sts into 20. If it’s easier, you can replace each inc 1, K1 with kfb (knit into front and back of stitch). That means that if you're knitting the pudding the increase rows would translate as follows:
Row 2 *inc 1, K1. Rep from * to end becomes:
Row 4 *Inc 1, K2; rep from * to end (effectively [inc 1, K1], K1) becomes:
Row 8 *Inc 1, K2, inc 1, K1; rep from * to end becomes:
And so on!

Making Up Instructions for Christmas Pudding
Run a length of yarn through the cast on stitches of the pudding and draw up to form a point.  With the wrong (p) side facing outwards, stitch up 1/3 of the side seam.  Repeat the process with the cast off seam and then turn the work right (k) side out.  Stuff lightly and then sew up remaining side seam.
 
Run a length of yarn through the cast on stitches of the icing and draw up to form a point. With the wrong (p) side facing outwards, stitch up the entire side seam.  Turn work right (k) side out and place on top of pudding. Stitch cast off seam in place around the pudding – try to make the seam as wavy as possible, just like authentic dribbly icing.

Perhaps we're just nosy, but we do love finding out what other people are knitting – particularly when it's beautifully and lovingly photographed. The Chapagne Bohemian blog is a feast of just that kind, and it's lovely to dip in and find out what's on the needles – how that hat's progressing or what that yarn turned into.

Like all the best blogs, the Champagne Bohemian provides a little bit of escapeism – if things go wrong, it's only knitting and they'll probably make you laugh, too – while still making you feel like you're talking to a friend at knit night.

Thanks to the author's great eye for colour after you've been reading this blog for a little while you'll probably find yourself rummaging through a completely different sections of your local yarn shop, trying out colours you'd never dared to – we're certainly inspired by her vibrant colour choices!

Read a great blog? Write a great blog? Tell us what it is and why you like it, and you might see it here next Friday. 

Knitting costs money.

There, I've said it. Someone had to. For weeks now various columnists and commentators in the mainstream media have been suggesting all sorts of ways to beat the credit crunch and, 'Take up knitting!' and 'Knit all your Christmas presents!' have been two oft-touted, really rather daft comments in these articles.

If you're reading this, you're almost certainly a knitter and already own a good number of needles and a stash of yarn, and if you're really keen you'll have planned your Christmas knitting months ago and will be well stuck into it by now. (One of my hyper-organised friends has just finished hers – impressive, eh?) But a newcomer to knitting will have to buy those needles and that yarn, and need time to learn and practice at least a little, unless they're giving everyone super-chunky garter-stitch scarves for Christmas.

I'm not saying people shouldn't knit, far from it. Knitting is a wonderful hobby that enables people to produce beautiful, unique items, and anyone who is given a hand-knitted Christmas gift will be lucky indeed, because a lot of time and love will be in those stitches. I'd love to see more people discovering the joy of creating something, and the pleasure of spending time with other knitters at their local knitting group. I just wish all these 'experts' wouldn't keep touting it as something people can pick up instantly and that costs next to nothing!

Your thoughts?